Nativity Shepherds

Today Nora's daycare had a special Christmas party in which one of the activities is dressing like shepherds and making the 200 meter trek from daycare to the town church where they have an amazing nativity scene set up, called a belén, which also means Bethlehem and is the name of my sister-in-law. I finally understand the enormous banner they put outside the church every Christmas saying "¡Tu belén está aquí­!" (Your Bethlehem is here!). It was amazing! I have decided to respect the Spanish law prohibiting the publication of photos of minors on this post. The other children do have faces, I've just blurred them.

The immense irony of the situation being that they are dressed as shepherds and need shepherding themselves.

It took me a while to spot my daughter. She's the one at the back with the grandma scarf on.

That one.

The "everyone hold onto a rope with loops tied in it" trick is what makes such an excursion remotely feasible.

My little old lady.

The Nativity Scene

I encourage you to check out the detail in the large version.

There was a "moon" in the sky. Also, sometimes there was lightning and thunder.

Many of the characters were animatronic, the fires were flickering, the water flowed, the windmill spun, and one house had smoke emanating from the chimney.

The star of the show.

The magi arrive from the east, one on camel, one on an elephant, and one on a horse.

The house with the smoke had lamps inside, a kitty on the deck, and a sow nursing piglets in the yard. You can see the blurred windmill in the background.

I struggle to imagine the number of hours of detailed work that went into this nativity scene. I was very impressed.

A group photo. Nora seemed content walking to the church with her friends, but as soon as she saw me, the balance of desires swung hard towards her needing to be with me holding my hand at all times. I was the only parent there, and she was the only child crying.